


Gifted

by cat_77



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types
Genre: Angel Blood, Gen, Headaches & Migraines
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-03
Updated: 2018-12-03
Packaged: 2019-09-06 08:53:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16829236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cat_77/pseuds/cat_77
Summary: Some gifts should come with return receipts.





	Gifted

**Author's Note:**

> For the “headaches/migraines” entry at hc_bingo.
> 
> * * *

It was Jace that noticed first. He didn’t say anything because she asked him not to. She didn’t even remember what excuse she gave at the time, but he bought it and life moved on.

Until the next time.

“You sure you’re okay?” he asked as he helped right her. She hadn’t even realized she had been listing to the side.

“Just tired,” she insisted. He looked doubtful, so she added, “Also, that was a lot brighter than I was expecting. Wow.” It explained her wince and the way she squinted against, well, everything, and the doubt turned to understanding instead. She made a show of using her stele over the runes she knew he would suggest anyway, surprised when they actually took the edge off.

Three days later was what Simon would officially call a doozy. She had needed to make a portal, then needed to use her sunlight rune against a vampire that really did not want them to use said portal. They got to where they needed to be, only for it to be warded and locked. She was able to break through that, only to find an entire fricken wall that needed to be moved. Another shiny vision later, and she had that shifted to the side and they finally had the mystical magical whatever literal moments before the idiots pursuing them got there. 

She was seeing double at that point, but knew they needed to get out of there in one piece. She opened another portal, this one back to right outside the Institute, and they all stumbled through before anyone could slice anyone else’s head off. Okay, that was a lie, one shapeshifting whatever slid through as well, but he was alone against four Shadowhunters right outside of their stronghold, so he was as good as toast anyway.

For her part, she still had to figure out how to manage the steps up into the building. She knew she slipped at least once but no one seemed to notice so she counted it as a win. It was no longer double, but triple of everything in front of her, with the added bonus of wavy lines that faded sharply at the edges.

Alec said something, but she had no idea what. She waited until everyone seemed to pay attention to him to scoot back and slink away. She had the path to her room memorized at that point, and could probably find it with her eyes closed. That was a good thing as she could barely keep them open. She bounced off of at least one wall and two doorways, but barely felt it against the pounding in her head.

Finally, she was there.

She didn’t bother with kicking off her boots or even unclipping her holster. She headed straight for the little table with its little drawer with its little bottle of peace. She lifted the bottle to find it surprisingly light. And quiet. Not that she could really hear anything over the roar in her ears, but usually there was the clack of the pills against the side when she raised it. She opened it and shook it and it took her an embarrassingly long time to realize nothing fell out into her palm.

“Shit,” she muttered as she tossed it to the side. She was fairly certain she had the backup bottle somewhere. Technically they were her mother’s prescription, but technically she didn’t care at that point. 

Her nose tickled and she swiped at it. She stared at the red that now stained her skin and realized that there was the intense possibility that this time was worse than usual. She wiped the blood on her already filthy jeans and tried to remember where the other bottle was. She bent to check a lower drawer and the pain surged even higher than before. She had to brace herself against the wood and swallow back the urge to vomit for a moment, all while she watched another drip of red betray her as it smacked against the paperwork she had left on top of the table.

“Clary?” a voice called from too far away. “Are you okay?”

She turned to find Jace in the doorway. Multiple versions of him, really, that faded in and out the same way his voice did. His eyes were wide, all seven of them, and he started to move towards her right about the time she managed to admit, “I don’t think I am.”

She crashed against the side of the bed before he could catch her and then, thankfully, the world went black.

She next opened her eyes to find that, nope, the agony of her head had not faded. She was laid out on something soft and she was fairly certain her boots were long gone. She turned to her side, surprised to not crush against her stele and blade, and reached for what she discovered was a pillow to pull over her head to block out the light.

“Turn those off?” she heard someone request. They were too loud. Everything was. And the light was still too bright when someone forcibly yanked the pillow from her grasp even though some part of her realized it only came in from a streetlight through the window in the room.

“What was she trying to take?” another voice asked. It might have belonged to the person checking her pulse, she didn’t open her eyes to find out.

There was rustling, so much noise. There were questions and discussions and she just wanted it to stop. A pillow had been foolishly placed beside her again and she grabbed it and wrapped its softness around her aching head, not sure if she left room to breathe and not fully caring either.

“Oh, Biscuit,” she heard, quieter now, and almost sympathetic. There was a wash of warmth over her that some small part recognized as likely magic. The pain spiked higher, just for a moment, and then it faded into blissful peace.

The next time she dared to open her eyes, the room as a whole was dark save for one tiny source of light. She focused on it for a moment to find it was a witchlight stuffed under a thin piece of material that may or may not have been one of Izzy’s scarves. There was an almost halo around it, a starburst of sorts, and she knew she wasn’t fully recovered yet.

A hand brushed against her forehead. Cool. Rough. Impossibly gentle. Which is why she felt bad when she flinched away.

“I take it you’re not feeling better yet?” Jace asked from somewhere beside her.

“Usually takes a while for the meds to kick in,” she admitted. Her voice was rough and unrecognizable even to herself through its whisper. She paused as she didn’t actually remember taking any. “Did you find them? I don’t...”

“You mean the empty bottle of something out of date that you didn’t tell us about?” he chided.

She frowned. “Mom’s might be out of date, but mine shouldn’t be. Not yet.”

“Clary...” he said, a clear warning to his tone.

She pushed herself up to face him properly for what was sure to be an argument. The room spun and she nearly collapsed backwards again instead. He caught her and lowered her down gently, a mass of throw pillows stuffed behind her to prop her slightly upright. “Thanks,” she muttered, her tongue sticking to the dry roof of her mouth.

There was a bottle of water next to the bed that she didn’t remember putting there and he helped her take a sip from it. “What were you dosing yourself with and how long... how long have you been addicted to it?” he asked once he took the bottle away.

She snorted, and instantly wished she had not. “Not addicted,” she insisted. “Prescribed medication from an actual doctor for migraines. The pills are supposed to stop the headaches and you only take them when you have one.”

Jace was silent for a moment and, when she looked over to him, appeared confused. “Shadowhunters don’t get headaches, not bad ones and not without a concussion or possession or something,” he sounded out slowly. “I don’t think our infirmary even carries stuff like what you were taking. I don’t know if I can even pronounce it.”

“Not a doctor from here,” she corrected. “Mundane doctor. Have had them for years. Mom had them off and on, said they were worse when she was pregnant with me.”

“Well, that confirms my theory,” a new voice said from the doorway. Magnus offered a pitiful wave and entered when she returned the gesture. “How are you feeling?” he asked when he was closer. His was barely whispering, and she appreciated the effort.

“Like I need a second pill, but I’m not sure I ever had the first one,” she admitted.

He nodded as though that made sense and waved his fingers in offering. A rush of blue surrounded her and some of the ache and dizziness faded, though not all. “I can take the edge off, but the Silent Brothers are working on something stronger.”

“It’s appreciated,” she admitted. She had seen him heal people literally ripped open by werewolves though, so his words didn’t quite make sense. “Wait, what’s so bad that you can’t fix it?” she asked with trepidation.

He sat at the edge of the bed and watched her sympathetically. “If my theory is correct, my demon magic is seen as a corruption to your angel blood,” he explained.

“But you’ve healed us how many times?” Jace asked, confused. “Alec alone, man. Izzy when she hit her head. Lydia when she broke her arm?”

“Pure angel blood,” Magnus amended. “As in the kind that Clary carries that grants her the very visions that are likely causing her pain.”

Jace frowned, and Clary feared he was soon going to realize just how long she had been hiding this from him. Instead, he asked, “But if her visions are gifts from the angels, why would they hurt her?”

“Less gifts, and more like communication of what is needed to help you in your tasks,” Magnus guessed, and Clary’s lips quirked up at the rather apt description. “Shadowhunters used to have such communication far more often, but the blood has been diluted over the centuries. When her father injected her with angel blood, she was simply able to pick up on the conversation again.”

“But why does it hurt?” she asked, needing to know. Was she not worthy? Were her ties to her admittedly corrupt and pretty evil father playing a role? Was she being punished for what he did?

“Because you’re human,” Magnus told her simply. “You are part angel, more so than most, but you are also human and, quite frankly, your human physiology was not made to deal with that much divine energy that often.”

“Then why would they keep doing it?” Jace asked. “I can’t believe that the angels would want her to have to go through this.”

Magnus shrugged, but his eyes stayed sharp and focused on her. “They have likely been trying for generations, maybe some of their suggestions coming through as that insane sixth sense you lot have, the way Shadowhunters tend to make connections others cannot. She’s just the first one to pick up on it more directly. She’s just the first one to actively reach out and initiate the dialogue.”

Clary glanced over to him guiltily. “If I concentrate, I can make things work. If I concentrate harder, I can learn new things,” she defended herself.

Magnus sighed as though that was to be expected. It probably was given the way he mumbled something about Shadowhunters and ridiculousness. He waved at Jace and asked, “Blondie, do you feel anything extra when you activate your runes without your stele?”

“Kinda like a little electric shock,” he admitted. “If I do it too much, it tires me out faster.”

Magnus held his hands up in a there you have it fashion. “You are both tapping into abilities that, yes, you have, but also, yes, they have a cost. You are taxing yourselves. Being that you are both stubborn, bullheaded Shadowhunters, I doubt either one of you is going to stop anytime soon.”

“So what do we do to help her?” Jace asked. Clary noted he didn’t mention his own issues or a want to stop them. Then again, she had yet to see him get a nose bleed from his little tricks.

“For now? Limit how often she does that thing she does,” Magnus suggested. He made a face and continued, “Only do it when you actually have the strength to do so, and make sure you have time to rest afterwards. And, when you inevitably ignore my sage advice, have friends to look out for you, and get you the help you’re going to need.”

Clary flopped against the pillows, not liking his answers. “Sometimes, there’s just not time for anything else,” she tried.

“And then you are left as you are today, in pain and damned near passed out in your own blood. You’re lucky you made it back here and weren’t in the middle of a horde of shax demons or something worse,” he scolded, but there was still sympathy to his words. He shook his head and promised, “I will help when I can. I have a friend who may be able to get us more of that prescription of yours but, let’s be real, even that may someday not be enough.”

“The Silent Brothers?” Jace prompted.

“May well find a cure,” Magnus admitted. Clary got hopeful despite the fact he clearly doubted it. “Or they may just suggest you pull her off of patrols and have her focus on research instead.”

Clary frowned. “Not going to happen,” she declared.

“You’re not going to have much of a choice if you continue doing what you’re doing,” Magnus said, not unkindly. He turned back to Jace and asked, “For tonight’s little debacle, how much could you have done without her gifts? How long would it have taken, and would you still have succeeded?”

Clary wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the answer. On the one hand, she liked the thought she was indispensable. On the other, she was practical enough to know the others had been doing this whole huge save the city if not the world thing long before she was in the picture. Jace would be kind, but blunt, especially if he figured out ways to keep her back. She was surrounded by people who wanted to protect her, which was fine, but they needed to know she wasn’t some damsel in distress and could help her own damn self, and save their asses at the same time.

“The portal she made to get us there gave us the element of surprise. We could have gotten there through other means, but it would have meant more of a fight. We tried almost everything to break through the wards, but she was the one to actually do it. All of us fought, all of us helped to get the artifact,” he said easily enough.

Magnus rolled his eyes. “Making a portal takes tremendous energy, and then you had her do more?” he scoffed. “I suppose you had her portal you home as well?”

Jace looked chagrined at that, or maybe she was projecting her own feelings on the situation. “Well, yeah,” he admitted. “But only-”

“Only after she moved a wall, and, hey, by the way, did either of them mention the way she fried a vampire as well?” Alec ratted them out when he entered. He turned to her and said, “You overdid it, Fray. We all do, but usually one us knows and gets the others to step back as needed. This time though?”

“None of you knew,” she finished for him with a sigh. She gave into the urge to rub at her temples. Some of it was from the exhaustion, and some of it was from trying to follow too many people at once while her head still ached.

“We do now though,” Izzy said as she joined the growing group. “Though it’d be helpful if you told us when it was getting too much.” She narrowed her eyes shrewdly and Clary carefully lowered her hands to fold them in her lap instead.

“I didn’t...” Clary started to protest, but stopped herself at the way every single one of them raised their eyebrows at her. “Okay, so I knew it was starting to be too much, but we were almost home.”

“And if we depended on you for coverage that you weren’t capable of? Or if one of us had to carry you? That’s a weakness we need to plan for,” Alec said with the forthrightness she had come to expect from him.

Isabelle smacked him on the arm and glared at him before she turned her attentions back to Clary. “What my tactless brother is trying to say is that if we know, we can plan, and it’s better for us all.”

“I’m sorry,” Clary insisted. “I really am. I didn’t mean to put you at risk, you have to believe that. I also didn’t mean to let things get quite this bad.” She ran her fingers though her hair and couldn’t tell if the catch and release of the tangles was soothing or aggravating instead.

“We believe you,” Jace told her even though she highly doubted Alec actually did. “Just... tell us next time? You need to learn that part, and we need to learn not to ask for too much.”

Magnus snorted at that. “Because that’ll happen,” he huffed in almost amusement. At least the glares were now turned on him instead of her, so there was that.

Alec broke the stalemate when he produced a small stoppered vial from behind his back. He offered it to her and said, “From the infirmary, drink it.” She opened it with the help from Jace and sniffed it warily. “It’ll taste like crap, but it should help.”

She downed it all in one go and resisted the urge to cough it right back up again. “I’d say thank you, but you weren’t lying,” she said. She reached for the water bottle and gulped down about half of it to try to rid her mouth of the taste.

“Now sleep, we’ll bug you more in the morning,” Alec ordered. He tugged on Izzy and Magnus, but didn’t even try with Jace, probably knowing him far too well.

Jace surprised them all though. After he helped Clary slouch back down against the pillows and tugged the blanket just so, he followed them to the door. She closed her eyes and started to drift almost immediately, but not before she heard him ask, “What was that? It smelled like the stuff you used to add to my tea when I couldn’t sleep.”

“It is,” Alec admitted. “Pure stuff to knock her out. It’s the only thing they could think of for now. No need for her to suffer while they search for a cure.”

The rest of their conversation faded out soon enough. She wasn’t aware of when the door closed, but she felt the dip of the bed and the familiar way Jace cupped her cheek, fingertips pressed lightly against her temple. “We’ll figure this out,” he promised. “Just take it easy until we do.”


End file.
